


Hold pattern

by LittleRoma



Series: Infusion Diaries [8]
Category: Arrow - Fandom, Buffy the Vampire Slayer
Genre: Research is fun damnit, Writer is going to go to bed, Writer is great at procrastination, Writer is not feeling great, if writer's essay on romantic poets were this easy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-17
Updated: 2017-01-17
Packaged: 2018-09-18 05:46:09
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,656
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9370790
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LittleRoma/pseuds/LittleRoma
Summary: Felicity's research shows up nothing new about the encroaching demon problem, Tommy gets himself into a funk.





	

EUGH, Felicity groaned to herself as she spun around in her office seat.  She had been sitting in the one position for too long, growing stiff in her time sat at her computer.  Thankfully, since the other night when the Slayers she and Tommy hadn’t actually seen any peskier demon signs popping up in Starling City.  Turns out that she just had to worry about the rampant corruption in Starling.  Because, she never would’ve thought that she could run into more corruption.  Still, one problem at a time, the last thing she needed above an overzealous boss (though was he really her boss if he didn’t seem to know what he was doing half the time, or did that confirm that Oliver Queen was indeed his boss) with a weird fixation for old-timey weaponry?

 

Still, at least he hadn’t caught onto Felicity’s extra-curricular after-hours general fighting sacrifice.

 

That at least was a small mercy, if there ever was one.

 

Mr Steele seemed to be more of her boss, but she got the impression that Mr Steele didn’t know all about what was happening at home.

 

At least the fact that he had sent Felicity into looking into a weird off-the-books investment made by his wife was strange.  Only to turn around a few weeks later (after giving her a blank notebook (was she in a stereotypical Harry Potter fanfiction now)) and tell her to leave well enough alone.  Did he guess nothing of the woman?

 

Felicity thought to herself that maybe the small slowdown had come at just the right time.

 

Though, Tommy probably thought differently.

 

After all, when your girlfriend decided to chase after her ex-boyfriend, (he was the best friend of ex-boyfriend), throwing him to the wayside, all to fall into the same old self-destructive patterns and the same toxic relationship, you probably needed a distraction.

 

Felicity just wondered to herself if Laurel Lance was completely alright.  Did she really have the low self-esteem that she still went back to relationships that she knew were no good for her

 

Oh well, she made no choices for anyone else, thank goodness!

 

You couldn’t be completely smart if you still went back and made those dumb decisions.

 

Whatever, Felicity just felt kind of bad for the girl’s long-suffering father.

 

She said kind of because Detective Lance had always ridden Tommy hard.  Maybe because he had seen Tommy growing up?  He knew what an asshole the guy had been as a kid?

 

But seriously?  The guy had changed.  He hadn’t even been arrested in a _long_ time.

 

Or well, he wouldn’t have been, if he didn’t have to perform Council duties every so often.  But she had totally gotten off from that light speeding ticket in Cleveland two months ago, or rather the Council would get both the Watchers and Slayer off any crimes they may have committed while performing their duties.

 

Or, as Giles was so fond of saying – their destinies.

 

Strange, that man that seemed like he could be as cold and rational believed in a fickle thing like destiny.  He didn’t seem like the type of guy to go all in for Romantic poetry.

 

But, wow wasn’t that a blast from the past?  Felicity had once dated some girl studying Romantic Era poetry (she was doing a degree in classical literature) and by God she didn’t think she had ever felt so resentful of fields of daffodils!  Maybe her cracks about William Shakespeare were a holdover from that relationship.

 

Why had the two of them broken up?

 

Oh, yeah, difference of opinion.

 

Though, did you ever break up with someone because you agreed with them?

 

Whatever, Felicity wasn’t a relationship counsellor, so she didn’t even need to pretend to have all the answers.

 

The point of her internal ramble (was she going for an Olympic level gold medal in internal rambles now?), she was beginning to doubt Detective Lance’s impartiality, he always looked at Tommy like he was fully expecting him to be doing something terrible and illegal.

 

Sure, because keeping the known world safe from vampires and the ‘oogie boogies of the night’ was awful.

 

Right now, though that wasn’t important.  At least now, while Felicity was sitting behind her laptop.  Everything was just beginning to blur into one line of gibberish, she couldn’t work like this.

 

Getting up from behind the laptop, shuddering as she heard her bones cracking, Felicity made her way into her kitchen, deciding to have herself a nice mug of hot chocolate, Felicity flicked on the kettle.  Digging through some of the cabinets, to try and find the small little barrel shaped cardboard can of powder, Felicity winced to herself as she saw some of the spreads and powered substances were out of date.  She was going to have to have a big clearing out.

 

Eugh, was that butter even safe to consume anymore?  She didn’t even want to think about those oddly coloured flecks in it.

 

Pouring the boiling hot water into the mug, Felicity slid a spoon into the cardboard container of brown powder.  Measuring out a few spoonfuls, she dumped them into the mug, watching with no small measure of satisfaction as the liquid turning to a swirling vortex of brown chocolatey goodness.

 

Taking a bag of marshmallows from one of the other cupboards, Felicity popped a few into the mug.  Felicity took a deep breath of her hot chocolate and took a warming sip.  She should now probably stop trying to analyse the patterns and begin to get ready for bed.

 

Felicity was startled out of her reverie when she heard the front door open and slam shut.  Damn sounded like Tommy was pissed.

 

Oh well, her hot chocolate was good, she wasn’t going to get worked up, just be amused in whatever the weird love triangle was that Tommy Merlyn had found himself in.

 

“DO YOU EVEN HAVE ANY IDEA HOW INSULTING AND DEMEANING THAT WOMAN CAN BE?  THAT RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN THE TWO OF THEM IS TOXIC AND I REALLY DON’T NEED TO BE DRAGGED EVEN FURTHER DOWN.  IT’S NOT AS IF I’VE BEEN DATING THE WOMAN FOR THE PAST THREE YEARS WHILE OUR RELATIONSHIP AND OH MY GOD HOW I HATE THAT TERM, BUT OH NO OLIVER FECKING QUEEN COMES BACK INTO THE PICTURE AND SUDDENLY I’M OLD NEWS, I’M NOT WORTH THE GODDAMN GROUND SHE WALKS ON, WHY DID I LET MYSELF GET PULLED INTO THIS AGAIN?” Tommy roared, making Felicity bite back a laugh as she listened to Tommy rant and rave.

 

About his favourite topic, because of course.

 

“I’m going to guess it’s because she is your blind spot, your weak spot.  Admit it Merlyn but she says jump and you say how high?” Felicity mildly replied while she crossed the kitchen to retrieve a copy of _Wired_ magazine.

 

“NO, SHE IS BLOODY WELL NOT, WHY DO I EVEN LET MYSELF GET INTO THESE SITUATIONS?”

 

“Well, Tommy it’s because you love her.  And I’m going to guess it’s because you’ve always loved her, always, ever since junior high based on what you’ve told me.  But she was always Oliver’s girl, at least that was the reason you tried to tell yourself when you didn’t even attempt to get to know her romantically.  Oliver Queen probably knew that and still dated her, I don’t know, I think maybe he wanted to test your dedication to him and your friendship.  But what do I know?” Felicity mildly spoke as she flicked through the magazine, there had been a fascinating article about next-gen laptops going through testing over the upcoming twelve months.

 

“We didn’t have one of those relationships, why on earth would he think he had to test our friendship.  That wasn’t his style?” Tommy plaintively asked.

 

“Well, like I said I don’t really know the guy, but he doesn’t exactly seem like the brightest bulb in the hardware store, you want to calm down now?” Felicity raised an eyebrow as she looked from her magazine.

 

“Yeah, what have you found?” Tommy yawned grasping onto the different topic with all the relief he had, audible in his voice.

 

“I haven’t been able to find anything else, anything new to indicate a growth in demonic activity, but I remembered something.  I went back and looked at some of the incident reports from Sunnydale and they all have the same thing in common.  Namely that whatever is going on, that it is leading to something big.  I can’t work out what yet, and the face that I can’t work out what’s going on, it’s troubling.  You haven’t heard anything?”

 

“No, no I haven’t heard anything yet, I can’t even remember coming across anything with a similar MO.  Unfortunately, you know what this means we have to do?”

 

“Yeah, wait and see, damn it I really hate this part, I didn’t sign up to be a goddamn soldier, I didn’t sign anything, I just do my damn job day in and day out.”

 

“I know what you mean, but unfortunately this means we’re just going to have to wait around and dance around to someone else’s tune.  Have any more names came up?”

 

“On Queen’s list?  Just the usual rich .5% corrupt so and so’s, it doesn’t seem to be leading anywhere, at least nowhere that I can tell.  I’m going to need to get that List off him if you want me to do anymore investigation.”

 

“Not the names I meant, but I think it would now be bloody difficult to get that dratted List off the man.  It would have been easy if he still the same guy from before the island, just flirt with him, push your boobs in his chest and he would be like putty in your hands.  I meant the names of potentials”

 

“Whoa there creepy mccreeperson, first don’t talk to me that way second, again you know that list is kept locked away.  Any other bright ideas?”


End file.
